Development an inservice programme concerning conceptual understanding and concept teaching for chemistry teachers and investigation of its influence in practice

SUMMARY Development of An Inservice Programme Concerning Conceptual Understanding and Concept Teaching For Chemistry Teachers and Investigation of Its Influence In Practice In this study, an inservice programme aimed to develop chemistry teachers' knowledge, skills and perspectives about conceptual understanding and contemporary methods of concept teaching was developed and, its influence was investigated in practice. The research sample consisted of 37 chemistry teachers working at Trabzon and Akçaabat. In this study, case study research methodology was used and, the data was gathered with questionaires, interviews, observations, achievement test, researcher diary and document analysis. Research was completed in four stage: need assessment, program development, implementation and evaluation. The course programme was prepared by using the System Approach Model. The implementation process lasted ten working-days both in Akçaabat and in Trabzon. The course implemented with order of presentation of theory, modeling, application, discussion. Findings showed that the inservice training was quite successful. To investigate the teachers' use of knowledge, skills, and perspectives in their teaching, five case study was conducted. The results showed that the teachers' implementation varied. While some teachers were able to apply and reflect sufficiently what were learned during the inservice training others were not. Referring to the findings of the study, five suggestions were recommended for other researchers. These are: (1) This course could be extended to other subject areas, (2) Professional Development Time (PDT) that teachers can attend easily should put work schedule, (3) this type inservice courses should be held periodicaly, (4) different inservice programmes should be developed and applied to teachers other than chemistry, (5) new research projects should be conducted on school-based professional development approach. Key Words: Chemistry Education, Inservice Teacher Training, Professional Development, Semantic Features Analysis, Concept Net, Concept Mapping, Conceptual Change Text, Drawings. IX